While Murray stunned the nation by winning a match and some other guy lost, Novak Djokovic’s crushing win over Jeremy Chardy went somewhat unnoticed, but win he did, 61 61. In encouraging news, his serve looked particularly good.

Juan Monaco, meanwhile, suffered another disappointing defeat, going down in straights to Victor Hanescu. I don’t know how much the wrist is bothering him, but his results certainly don’t seem to justify postponing the surgery.

Obligatory disbelieving look over the net.

I’ll bet that some martyred, long-suffering pleading with the umpire was involved as well.

The unseeded Wawrinka and Lopez both had thorough straight sets wins and were apparently looking very good, while Nose Job prevailed over Horseface and Lleyton Hewitt had a tough win over Mikhail Youzhny in three.

David Ferrer beat Evgeny Korolev to face Andy Murray in the second round, and last week’s girl Thiemo de Bakker was forced to retire in the third set against Viktor Troicki.

Andy Murray won a match. An actual match. In a tournament. Against a human. A fully-grown human male who knows how to play tennis.

HALLELUJAH!

OK, I’m not getting ahead of myself here. God knows he should be beating Seppi et al precisely as routinely as he did. And god also knows he will be losing to Ferrer in the next round, probably in straights. But after the long drawn-out (or short and sharp, thank you, PEHK and Robin) agony of watching him since the Australian Open, this was a tonic. He looked like he wanted to be out there, he was focussed and a bit feisty, his backhand was back on song and he even hit a few forehand winners. By which I obviously mean that he pushed the ball weakly across the net and his opponent managed to fall over his own feet and missed it, because we all know that’s what he does.

Biggest shock ever/mildly surprising result (depending who you ask) in Rome today as Ernests Gulbis came back from a set down to hand Roger Federer his earliest defeat at this event in seven years.

I didn’t see the match and I’m not really sure what to think about it. I do find the fact that Ernie apparently squandered six match points, including two double faults, before serving it out to love, somehow delightfully reassuring. He said afterwards:

“I couldn’t put a serve in […] I was shaking. I didn’t know what to do. It was a terrible feeling.”

Or, according to possibly more frank sources on twitter, he admitted to “shitting his pants”. Which Roger won’t be doing.

“You cannot be 100 per cent all the time,” Federer said. “Sometimes it takes a loss like this to wake up and shake your mind. It can be that things are too simple, and days like this make you realise how difficult it is to dominate the tour. I didn’t feel safe at any time today, my game wasn’t up to its normal standard. Of course Roland Garros is in the back of my mind but I have two tournaments to get the wins I need. And I’m still in the doubles.”

As for Ernie, I’m feeling more and more like he’s destined to be a dangerous floater; the guy who drives his fans to distraction, but who none of the top seeds want to see in their part of the draw. I’m not convinced yet about his ability to put together back-to-back wins with enough frequency to be, say, a fixture in the top 10 despite all his talent, but there are more deep runs at Slams in his future. What do you think?

“I just started concentrating more on tennis, treating it more like my job,” Gulbis said. “Last year I didn’t take it as a job. It was more like a hobby. I didn’t have a system.

“Before I was practicing maybe three days and then going out with friends two days. I’m still not a big tennis freak … but I have a better system. My team is perfect now. It’s my coach, my fitness coach and my father.”

Imagine what he could accomplish if he ever became a ‘big tennis freak’. The mind boggles.

Say hello to Santiago Giraldo, the reason you won’t be seeing Boss this week.

Apparently he played a really impressive match, but Boss seemed rather out of sorts. I hope he’s not injured.

Anyway, after that disappointing result, most of the rest was business as usual. Ljubicic, Isner, Kohlschreiber and Llodra all flirted with defeat before coming through in three, earning in Kohlschreiber’s case the dubious reward of a meeting with Rafa in the next round.

Enjoy.

Tomas Berdych, also in Rafa’s quarter, won in straights and Ernests Gulbis fairly demolished Marcos Baghdatis to set up a meeting with … Roger Federer. Sigh.

A ruthless performance from Dinara. Svetlana didn’t play a bad match by any stretch of the imagination, but she failed to step up on the big points (2 of 8 on break point conversions) and got very down on herself in the second set. Dinara had her competitor’s hat on, converted 50% of break points, and served out the match despite a slight wobble. She got into Kuznetsova’s head and set up house there.

A really great win for the world no. 1, and a great week for Kuznetsova too. Beating Jankovic and Azarenka back to back is no small ask. If these two maintain their current form, the next few weeks could be really fun.

Almost as much fun as the match was the trophy presentation, in which Dinara giggled uncontrollably, swore, credited her mother’s breast milk for the win, and publicly asked if Zeljko still wanted to work with her after being “pissed” at her during the match with Zheng. I really hope it turns up on youtube. Fucking hilarious.

Two really good matches in Rome today, and at the end of all things, we have an all-Russian final.

Svetlana Kuznetsova d. Victoria Azarenka, 62 64

Azarenka played a really good first set, but Svetlana played a sublime one. Her forehand was on and she really exposed Azarenka’s problems moving on clay (which she needs to sort out ASAP). Then early in the second set Victoria got a bad line call (and it was a bad call – umpire looked at the wrong mark) and exposed her other weakness for all to see – difficulty controlling her emotions. She completely fell apart.

Sveta, in contrast, was a picture of composure. Apart from a brief wobble serving for the match, where she lost it momentarily and had to break for it in the end, she was totally focussed and playing great tennis. Where has this Sveta been?! I don’t know, but it’s great to have her back.

This match was totally eclipsed by the one after it, however.

Dinara Safina d. Venus Williams, 67(3) 63 64

Three hours and ten minutes of ridiculously intense, high-quality tennis. I still don’t know how Dinara won that match. Venus came out playing amazingly and Dinara looked like she was going to get rolled. But she hung in there and somehow clawed her way into a tiebreak. Which she lost.

But in true classic Dinara “the cockroach” Safina style, she came back. She worked harder, used every opportunity to really hit out on her forehand, ran miles, and … just kept coming back. Even after she broke – twice – and was broken back each time in the third set, she didn’t give up. Nor did Venus, by the way.

Dinara finally got the break for 5-4. But even then, it wasn’t straightforward. She faced four (I think) break points, had three double faults, and really struggled to serve it out. It was agony to watch, and then so good when she finally got it. A landmark win for the world no. 1, and her first ever victory over Venus.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m a great fan of Venus. But this match encapsulates what I find so compelling about Dinara. She isn’t the great natural talent. She doesn’t even seem like a natural winner. And she’s not playing the kind of tennis that she was playing this time last year.

But somehow, she renders that irrelevant by the sheer strength of her will. Her resilience, her willingness to endlessly work, her audacity and her resolve manage to overcome not just players who are objectively better than she is, but who are almost playing better tennis on the day. Point after point, she drags all the pieces of her game together and when it’s not working, she forces it to work, to be effective. She makes the match about her and her tennis, and she never gives up, especially when it comes to situations in which a sane person would despair.

I suppose what I’m saying is this: what more could you ask for in a world no. 1?

Davai, Dinara.

NB: I seem to have misplaced my irony. Don’t worry, it’ll be back later.